Around the NFL: A little baseball vs. football

My wife got in a little dig last summer. She produced a miniature pillow inscribed with the words, “We interrupt this marriage to bring you football season.”

Steve Doerschuk

My wife got in a little dig last summer.

She produced a miniature pillow inscribed with the words, “We interrupt this marriage to bring you football season.”

To my dear wife: Thanks for pardoning the interruption.

For a fellow with my background and disposition, covering the NFL is a marvelous job. I’m thankful for it.

It also is a time-eating job. There’s rarely a day between late July and the end of the season not consumed for at least a few hours by work.

Yes, I know. If you have a problem with that relative to the position, there are plenty of people eager to suffer your problem.

Within that context, it was strange to take a day off three days into training camp, as I did Friday.

It was the only day a trip to Wrigley Field could be arranged. My friend Art, his son Greg and my son Walt made the long drive to one of the seven wonders of the sports world. (You tell me what the other six are.)

Art arranged the trip and the tickets. Both of our sons are recent high school graduates headed for college. It was something we wanted to give them. And sure, it was an indulgence for both of us, as well.

I’d been inside Wrigley but never for a game. It’s not quite right to say it was everything I imagined because scenes full of surprise and charm popped up one after another all day.

One surprise: Right in front of our seats down the left field line, in that bullpen way too close to the field for safety, a football story popped up.

A strapping fellow began to warm up.

“That’s Jeff Samardzija,” Walt said.

Honestly, I’d forgotten where in the baseball world the former Notre Dame wide receiver had disappeared to. I’d read the roster on my Wrigley scorecard, and his name was not on it.

“The Cubs just called him up,” Walt said -- as a dad, you want your kids to be smarter than you, right?

Samardzija was Brady Quinn’s favorite target right down the highway, catching 155 passes in 2005 and ’06 at Notre Dame. I remember the receiver as a pretty boy with beauty-parlor hair who was pretty doggone good. He probably would have been a first-round NFL draft choice in 2006. He struck me as a Joe Jurevicius type -- Jurevicius has helped three teams get to Super Bowls -- with better numbers.

Samardzija took note of the truckloads of cash showered on baseball players.

Being good enough to project as a top pitching prospect, he had no problem turning his head on the mere bags of cash dangling from an NFL vision.

Top baseball prospects flop at a much higher rate than “can’t-miss” football guys. Samardzija, though, got to the majors at warp speed.

It added to the fun to see him warming up.

A Harry Carey burger, the Waveland Avenue bustle, the Wrigley organ music and the friendly ghosts all around the ancient park would have been plenty to make it a day. Seeing Jeff Samardzija’s MLB debut would be a bonus.

Cubs Manager Lou Piniella obliged in the seventh inning.

Samardzija came out smokin’. On consecutive pitches, he threw fastballs posted at 95, 96 and 97 mph.

Perhaps he checked the radar from the corner of his eye and wanted even more. After a strikeout, he waited for Florida Marlins superstar Hanley Ramirez to step in.

He took an exaggerated windup and reached way back, as if trying to touch second base, before uncoiling the full extent of his large frame.

Woosh ... 99 mph.

Later in the at-bat, Ramirez singled. Samardzija wound up giving up a damaging run.

The countenance of the crowd, from the overstuffed grandstand to the Waveland rooftops, turned from heaven to purgatory. On the crowded streets after a loss, my pal Art shook his head. Piniella blew it by breaking in Samardzija in a one-run game in the middle of a pennant race, Art said.

I see it another way. If Samardzija can keep throwing like that, he can be a Joba Chamberlain. He can play twice as long as he would have in the NFL and make four times the money.

Back on the NFL beat, one of the first guys I saw was Samardzija’s old quarterback.

After just two innings Friday, Samardzija has thrown more “big-league pitches” than Quinn, who got in just one game with the 2007 Browns.

Quinn, it can be noted, was a pro baseball prospect, delivering his fastball in the 90-mph range at age 16 before committing to football full time.

For now, baseball seems more certain for Samardzija than football is for Quinn.

Samardzija is up in the bigs and throwing 99. Quinn might basically sit out 2008 unless Derek Anderson goes down.

Yet Quinn isn’t interested in shrinking into the shadows. On Saturday, he did what has been his custom this training camp, staying 30 minutes after practice to sign autographs for basically anyone who wants one -- and that’s a lot of folks.

Today, I noticed, Anderson was out there signing autographs near Quinn. Quinn is pushing Anderson on and off the field.

My quick sense tells me Samardzija will become a big item in the sport he has chosen. It tells me the same kind of thing about Quinn.